adventure march across your lives
by wearethewitches
Summary: When loneliness gets to Regina, after repeating the same day for years on end, she puts out an advertisement; WANTED: email pen-friend, preferably female, no pictures, no private details exchanged, willing to pay one hundred dollars a month for substantial conversation. Contact at-
1. Chapter 1

_WANTED: email pen-friend, preferably female, no pictures, no private details exchanged, willing to pay $100/month for substantial conversation. Contact at Her-Majesty .com_

The advertisement, in retrospect, is a mistake – but Regina is aching for company. Sixteen years under the Dark Curse and she's ready to go mad. Everyone is terrified of her and if they aren't, well, that's only because Regina knows how to reward her loyal guards. Frankly however, if Regina becomes insane enough to seek out those people – knowing that they're simple guardsmen or she actually has the potential to enjoy their company because she _liked_ their true selves – then there really is something wrong. Even an insane Regina should know not to approach her subordinates in such a manner.

The first week, there are spammers, sending her viruses or thrice-daily offers on deals for things like lawnmowers and insurance. Regina had made a new email specifically for this endeavour and is glad she did – deleting it will at least stop her inbox from filling up so quickly, easily outnumbering the actual emails she gets, no different from yesterdays, literally.

Then: an actual reply.

 _Dear Her-Majesty,_

 _Hi. I saw your ad in the paper and I hoped the offer was still available? I'm female, but because you asked for no private details to be exchanged, is that okay? Sorry if this is too short, you probably have so many other people asking for a hundred dollars a month for some emails._

 _From, swanknightforever_

The email is from swanknightforever and it surprises Regina enough that she actually decides to reply.

 _Dear swanknightforever,_

 _Thank-you for replying to my advertisement. The offer is available, though I would hope that for the money I'm offering, there would be more than just 'some emails'. I work as a high-ranking town official in a small town where everybody knows my name and what horrible a fate I could bring them should they anger me. I do not have friends and my family has long since left me, one way or another._

 _By 'private details', I was referring to details that could potentially reveal who either of us are – so no names, places or other such specific pieces of information._

 _If you would like to go through a trial period of back-and-forth emails, involving at least four substantial emails per week for a fortnight, then please reply to this email appropriately._

 _Regards, Her-Majesty._

* * *

Swanknightforever takes exactly two minutes to reply. Her answer is long and spiralling. It starts by agreeing to the trial period, before – as if she were speaking rather than typing, with thankfully few spelling mistakes – going on about having her first pizza in three years from a takeaway on a bus stop, only to be shouted at a bus-driver when one stopped in front of her. They'd mistaken her intentions, ranting and raving at her for wanting to bring food on their bus and she throwing a piece in their face in retaliation.

Regina replies, detailing her amusement but adding that perhaps, she should refrain from eating at bus stops from now on. Swanknightforever, heartily agrees, though notes that bus-stops are usually drier than walls. She goes on to tell another story – _I've got LOADS, don't worry about me running out of material!_ – about the one time when her foster-brother convinced her seven-year old self it was a good idea to pretend to be falling out of the window. She'd climbed out, hanging on by the tips of her fingers, before calling for the foster-mother, who screamed upon seeing her dangling, startling her into actually letting go.

To Regina's annoyance, she leaves it at that and later, when she's home from the town hall, she replies with gusto, asking what happened and the next day, getting a reply informing her that seven-year old self had taken a trip to the emergency room and then to another foster-home, after the foster-parents discovered that she'd deliberately climbed out. Swanknightforever doesn't know what happened to her foster-brother, but they'd been on the verge of adopting him, so he might have stayed.

After a fortnight and a half, Regina replies with a post-script, giving swanknightforever a new email to reply to and asking for her bank details so she can send her fifty dollars and after another four weeks of emailing, a subsequent hundred.

Swanknightforever then handily informs her – via her new email, _Queen-of-Evil .com_ – that she doesn't have bank details.

It presents a conundrum that swanknightforever handles herself, providing a drop-box address and telling her to take the postage out of her payment. Regina takes a few days to get that sorted out on her end, however, as Storybrooke is, of course, cut off from a lot of major systems. However, adding a drive to the nearest town every fourth Tuesday to her schedule gives Regina the chance to test her limits.

The emails continue, swanknightforever providing her some entertainment and Regina experiments with her ability to leave town – but she isn't like Ruby Lucas, who throws a temper tantrum every few years and gets herself into a car crash, along with giving Granny herself a heart-attack. It's a cruelness that Regina didn't ever expect but, well…

How would they stay in town otherwise?

* * *

There comes a point where Regina realises there's a trend in swanknightforever's emails. Looking back at their emails – rereading them, laughing a little but eventually falling quiet as her suspicions mount up – the former queen realises that her friend has had as hard a life as she has. Stories about being yelled at, tricked, manipulated by both strangers and people she should have been able to _trust_ inspires Regina to write far more carefully than she has before.

Swanknightforever, a far more perceptive person than Regina thinks, points it out and asks what's going on.

Regina replies truthfully, that all of swanknightforever's emails point to an unhappy life, no matter how interesting it might be to a complete stranger. She apologises, making sure to explicitly say that she does not pity her – Regina's own life has been far from happy and she knows that pity is far from anything she ever wanted or still wants, to this day.

Swanknightforever's email back takes a long time, technically breaking the rules she'd set up about emails per week – though certainly, she'd broken them before, but she still always gave Regina prior notice about the lack of internet – but eventually, she replies with a new story, absolutely disregarding Regina's previous correspondence. Keeping the peace between them, Regina doesn't mention it again, but rather than simply express her thoughts and amusements in her replies, she gives her own small stories, telling swanknightforever about living elsewhere and adapting to America.

At one point, she even mentions her mother's treatment of her – of being emotionally abused, in less damning words – and if that doesn't show trust from Regina Mills, nothing does.

Swanknightforever inspires her outwith snappy retorts and pouring her heart out, though. Hearing about foster-care and what can happen even to the prettiest, the most blonde-haired and blue eyed girls – swanknightforever learns that Regina is a brown-haired, brown-eyed girl in reply – causes a different kind of unrest from loneliness. Eventually, she goes to Gold, who arranges the paper-work and argues his way around her supposed Latina designation, single relationship status and even how many hours she works. Despite how they hate each other, the man – somehow – appreciates the need, the want for children.

In the millennium, swanknightforever warns that her drop-box location is going to change a lot. Regina doesn't particularly mind, though she wonders if her friend is homeless, which truly, would be the least of all the things that have happened to her friend in the past. She even ramps up her hundred dollars a month to five, which swanknightforever appreciates more than she can articulate. She's in no way strapped for cash, her salary repeating over and over again in Storybrooke from a seemingly unknown source and her bank balance resetting- or maybe not even changing when she takes out swanknightforever's money. It's one of the things Regina doesn't take for granted, despite Storybrooke's closed-loop economy.

December: complete silence.

Regina gets worried, then angry. When February comes with no word – almost three months of no emails, no replies – Regina cuts off swanknightforever from her precious five hundred dollars a month. It takes another three weeks for Regina to regret it, frequently panicking that maybe the lack of money is ruining her life, that maybe she's stuck somewhere, that maybe she's even dead. She gets all the missing money and posts it to swanknightforever's drop-box, continuing to both email and post the money as the year progresses. Her only distraction – the _only_ thing to take more of her attention – is the adoption agency she's signed with alerting her to a possible child.

On August nineteenth, he's born. Three weeks later, Regina takes him home from Boston, unable to stop smiling.

 _Henry Daniel Mills, my little prince._

It takes a lot of her attention and briefly, she stops emailing swanknightforever, for a few months. In late November, Regina starts again, writing to her friend and apologising for the stop in emails, though informs her that – still – she's been sending her money, worried about her. Regina, however, does not tell her about Henry. Henry is hers and she…she can't call him by another name for the sake of a privacy agreement.

It's best to not mention him at all.

* * *

February, Regina receives her first email from swanknightforever in over a year.

 _Dear Her-Majesty,_

 _I am so sorry. Things happened, really bad things. My ex-boyfriend framed me for a job he did involving some stolen watches and I got eleven months in prison, though two of those months were spent being locked up still, while they argued my sentence. My lawyer tried really hard, but they lost. I had to get together some money to make the drive to my last drop-box – I nearly forgot where it was, I had to look really deep through our emails, which are all really, really sweet and nice (your ones, I mean, the new ones). I hope you can still forgive me, despite all the effort you've made over the last while. I'm really, REALLY sorry._

 _From, swanknightforever._

Comparing it to their previous emails, it's fairly short but Regina still sucks in a breath and puts a hand to her mouth because _how?_ How could her friend be framed and still get chucked in prison? She emails back frantically, asking all her questions and ignoring all her work as she waits, looking after Henry and stressing. Swanknightforever doesn't reply for another two days, though, telling her about the entire thing and how she's only just tracked down another library to use the internet from – she has a car now, the same one she and her boyfriend apparently stole, but made legal now.

Regina's blood boils a little.

She's best friends with an _actual felon?_

Regina fumes over her replying, getting angry and ranting, but as soon as she goes to review the email for spelling errors, she deletes the entire thing and starts afresh, dictating her thoughts in a far more pleasant, if formal reply. She writes to swanknightforever and tells her about worrying, about thinking she might be dead or in a coma, about going through an entire _year_ without contact.

Swanknightforever replies and at the end, she signs her name, _Emma Swan._

* * *

"Hello," Regina starts when the phone picks up. "Is this Emma?"

A breathy, crackly laugh comes through the receiver. " _Hi._ "

She has a deeper voice than Regina had imagined. Upon telling her so, Emma laughs again before agreeing, vice versa. Regina asks her about her day, Emma humming before replying.

" _It's rainy, here. Sort of muggy. I'm in Tallahassee, that's in Florida._ "

"That's very far south of where I am," Regina notes quietly, before hearing Henry crying through the baby monitor. She listens to Emma describe it and her day, how she'd seen over four alligators and screamed each time, going up to Henry's room and interrupting Emma before she opens the door. "Sorry, but you might hear my son crying, just keep talking."

" _You have a son, now?_ " Emma questions as she goes inside, putting the phone on speaker as she sets it down, picking Henry up. " _Wowza, that's a screamer._ "

"Yes, he is," Regina says, leaning him on her body, over her shoulder. He keeps crying, a heavy, warm weight on her. "I adopted him, before you ask about a mystery partner I've never mentioned."

" _Wow, god, I didn't- you, you adopted him?_ " Emma's voice is plain _awe_. She's quiet as Regina starts singing softly, voice deep and soft, Henry falling into a doze. " _Regina?_ "

"Yes, Emma?"

" _Why did you adopt him?_ "

"Your stories," Regina admits, picking up the phone and taking it off speakers, sitting carefully on the nursery's rocking chair. "I've always wanted to be a mother, but I can't – it was voluntary, because of how terrible my situation, at the time. I've told you how my mother arranged my first marriage?"

" _Yeah- yeah, you did. Good thing you don't live in that country anymore._ "

"Very good." Regina feels something in her throat stick as she keeps going, Henry curling into her chest. It's still time for him to sleep – he's supposed to wake up at eight, with a second midnight bedtime so he sleeps nights. "I've been alone so long. You were, are my friend, but…I just wanted someone. Your stories of living in foster-care inspired me. I wanted to be a mother and I could be, a different way. Henry's the most important thing in my life, now and I've only regretted it enough to consider bringing him back once."

" _Once is all it takes…_ " Emma says and Regina might have gotten angry, had she not understood how lonely Emma actually is – has always been.

"Henry Daniel Mills. I named him – adopted him as soon as I could. When he was born, I got a notification and I met him three weeks later for the first time. I took him home and I didn't want to ever let go…except that once, but when we pulled up outside the adoption agency, I couldn't do it. He's mine, my son, I'm his mother and I am never going to give him up, ever. He'll always come first, always."

" _I hear you, I've got it. Henry comes first, always._ "

"Always."

* * *

In the summer before Henry's third birthday, mid-two thousand and four, Emma makes the drive up to Storybrooke, Maine, leaving Florida behind after two and a half years of waitressing and night-classes that Regina insisted she take after learning Emma was eighteen. Regina has a picture Emma sent of herself – the first one she'd ever seen of her, holding up her small graduation diploma, listing her twelfth grade-equivalent qualifications – and she has it framed, hanging on the wall near the fireplace, on the edge of a giant collage of pictures of Henry.

They meet on her doorway, Emma tugging nervously on the sleeves of a red leather jacket, blonde hair pulled back in a braid and Regina in a crisp black blazer and red dress, Henry on her hip, clinging like a limpet.

"Hi," she breathes, staring at her.

Regina stares for a long moment, feeling slightly overwhelmed at both the fact that she is finally meeting Emma Swan and that a stranger from another realm is in Storybrooke _at her behest._ Henry waves upon seeing her, peering at her curiously.

"Hello!" He says, before Regina quickly copies him. Emma chuckles, obviously tense. Regina can see a yellow Beetle in front of her gate and thinks, _that's the car Neal left her._

"U, it's nice to finally meet you, I guess."

"Yes," Regina agrees, before motioning inside, "Would you like to come in? Do you have any bags?"

"Yeah, I'll just- I'll just go get them, if that's okay?"

Regina has already made up the spare bedroom for her, dusted and opened the window to air it. Showing the obviously impressed Emma around the house, Regina makes sure she knows where the bathroom is and where both Regina and Henry sleep before inviting her to help make dinner, having expected her a little later when she'd already finished. Henry gets sat in front of the television with his toys, Emma following Regina's instructions, setting out the table and stirring white sauce.

"You're all so put together," she mumbles at one point, when Regina is adding steamed vegetables to mince, garlic and chopped tomatoes.

"I suppose I am," Regina replies casually. "But I'm older than you. I've had time to get things organised and trust me, Henry keeps surprising me. Last week for instance, he decided he didn't like vegetables."

"I think every kid decides they don't like vegetables at some point."

"Yes, but this comes from a child who was only introduced to meat a month ago. He's developed an obsession for German sausage."

Emma gives an incredulous look, "Last month?"

"Yes. He's got enough teeth and is old enough to know not to swallow grapes whole. It was his favourite pastime," Regina rolls her eyes, as if each time he did it didn't give her a heart attack.

"I think you told me, over the phone once," Emma shakes her head, stirring the white sauce. "I used to do that, I think. I don't like grapes anymore."

"That's something we can agree on. Henry cries if we pass them in the supermarket, without picking them up."

Emma's lip quirks, "Kind of like me and pizza."

Regina gives Emma a serious look. "I am not buying frozen pizza for you while you live in this household. It's either home-fresh or nothing."

Emma's eyes widen. "Home- _fresh?_ "


	2. Chapter 2

The Mills' enjoy Emma's company for a month and a half, before she leaves them to move into a flat in Boston, which Regina insists on paying the rent for. _I already pay you five hundred dollars a month for the benefit of your friendship, that salary being the same price as your rent. Let me do this, please._ Emma grumbles about it, but allows her to be generous.

As Emma's criminal history makes her ineligible to join the Boston Police Force, she makes do as a bail bondswoman, until Regina convinces her that she can do better. Emma jokingly says that if she wants her to do better, then she can pay for her to go for college.

Regina, never one to back down, agrees to do so, on the basis that Emma keeps her GPA above 3.0

Emma subsequently finds herself doing more night-classes, the two thousand and four intake been and gone. She doesn't know what she wants to do, not really, though with the night-classes she eventually decides on nursing, of all things. She waitresses and visits Regina and Henry every couple of weeks, driving the four hours from Boston to Storybrooke without a single complaint.

Regina phones her every few days, but most of their conversation is through emails, like old times. Henry then doesn't get the chance to use up all Emma's time when they call each other. Her son misses Emma a lot, despite having known her only a short time.

"It's your terrible influence," Regina jokes.

" _It's your forced vegetables_ ," Emma jokes back.

Time passes. Emma doesn't visit as much as she starts working for her nursing degree, keeping on track and focussing on learning all she needs to. Regina commends her, eventually wishing she could do it – go to university and get a degree. Her Storybrooke counterpart remembers doing it, getting a Law degree before running for Mayor in Storybrooke, but Regina knows it wasn't real. _I have Henry to look out for, too._

"You should do a correspondence course," Emma recommends. "If you're that bored, I mean. It'd be a lot of work for a full-time mom and worker."

"I love how you say full-time mother first," Regina chuckles as she signs a form, a knock on her office door from her secretary telling her that she has an urgent visitor. "You might be right though. I have to go – mayoral business."

When Emma receives her Associate Degree in Nursing, Regina is much more shocked than she should be to find out that her friend – _easily_ her best friend – is moving to Storybrooke. She finds out, rather than through Emma herself, through the hospital, who find it unusual for a non-resident to apply. Immediately after realising it's her, Regina calls, Emma picking up after the fourth ring.

"Why didn't you tell me you were moving to Storybrooke?" She demands.

" _How did you find out?_ "

"I'm the Mayor."

Emma gives a nervous laugh. " _Right. So, uh, is that okay? I mean, I want to move to Storybrooke because you guys are there and you're like, the only friend I have in the world-_ "

Regina interrupts her, then and there, telling her that it's brilliant, that it's perfect – that she should move to Storybrooke and just come live with them.

"It's not as if you don't have your own room," Regina says at the end of her little speech, a little breathless as she realises how that might all sound. "If you want to, of course and if you don't, I can convince Gold to rent you a place that isn't a dump-"

" _I'd love to move in with you._ "

It's safe to say, Henry's ecstatic when they break the news to him, at the very least.

* * *

At some point, Regina worries. Would the Curse kick Emma out? Kill her for staying? Would Emma realise that no-one aged? That the day repeated, over and over? However, it…it must be how the Curse interacts with the world, because time rolls on. The clock starts, the day from before rolls on and while no-one ages, Regina hears some amused whispers about how the children – who move on up grades in the school, graduate from the high school and enter the kindergarten – don't look any older, even though months have passed.

Emma, despite being as perceptive as she is, doesn't really care.

"This town is weird," Emma shrugs. "My lie detector goes off all the time. I was pretty paranoid in the beginning, when I first came here to see you guys, but…yeah, this town is weird."

Regina wonders, when she thinks of Emma's perfect little lie-detecting superpower, if this realm really _is_ the Land Without Magic.

Her worries abate, over time. Henry's sixth birthday passes before something new resurfaces, as Emma frowns at Henry and squints, before finally disappearing for two weeks, phoning Regina after two days and giving a bald-faced lie about a friend reconnecting and how she knows that _Storybrooke doesn't like strangers visiting._ Regina is angry and when Emma finally returns, a purple star below the dandelion on her wrist, she almost completely loses it, except…

Except, Emma hurriedly explains that she was pregnant when she was in prison, that she gave away a baby on the _nineteenth of August, Henry's birthday_ in a closed adoption and that yes, she lied about a friend reconnecting with her at first, but then a friend actually did find her again and apologised and asked her if they could have a second chance. Regina learns that the friend is called Lily and that Lily is the reason she has a purple star tattoo on her wrist beneath her dandelion.

It's an overload of information but frankly, Regina doesn't care a whit about this _Lily_ until Emma says she's her girlfriend and then, oh, oh _gods, the jealousy that rushes over her could be a tsunami_.

"What are you going to do?" Regina questions her best friend, her friend who she is losing to some upstart who thinks she can come swanning back into _her_ Swan's life.

"I'm going back to Boston for a couple of weeks, to stay with her. We're only just back together-" _back_ together? "-but, I mean, I've loved her for so many years and we need to see how things go. I'll be back, don't worry, but even if things go bad between us, I need to get some closure. We're adults now and not so naïve. Just as hot-headed though, we got piss-drunk when we got each others tattoos."

Regina spirals, slightly, as Emma stays in Boston. She drinks each night, drowning her sorrows and that damned _jealousy_ in both her dark purple-red wine and Emma's scotch. _When did that even happen? When did it become my wine and Emma's scotch? When did this part of the sofa become hers and that part mine?_ It gets so bad that even Henry notices it and one day, Graham is phoning to ask if she picked up Henry.

She had not.

Regina is frantic with worry, but only Graham is the one to know that Henry is gone. She can't tell anyone else and Graham agrees not to inform anyone who asks. Regina doesn't know what to do and it's only in the early evening does she realise that everything about tonight is so familiar, so, _so_ familiar.

"The town reset. The town… _when_ did the town reset?" Regina drives home, only to find a familiar yellow bug in her driveway, the door unlocked and her lights on. Heart beating fast, she sniffs, smelling her familiar lasagne but with too much garlic. Stumbling into the kitchen finds Emma at the stove, Henry sitting at the island table with a tall brunette.

"Mommy!" Henry grins at the sight of her, before Regina rushes over, wrapping him in her arms.

"Henry! Where were you? I was so worried!"

"I was getting Emma," Henry says with a small grin, Regina's hands coming to clutch his face. "I'm fine, mommy. I went on the big bus and when the police asked me where I was going I gave them Emma's address and they took me right to her!"

Regina looks up at Emma to confirm her story, the blonde tilting her head with a tired sigh.

"Gave me a fright. Sorry I didn't call to say I had him, but my phone was dead – forgot to charge it before going on shift at the clinic. I was too tired to drive though, so Lily volunteered." At this, the brunette waves.

"You must be Regina, hey."

"Hello," Regina says, standing up straight and clutching Henry's shoulders. "Thank-you for driving Emma and Henry home."

"Home?" Lily raises an eyebrow, glancing at Emma. "I knew it."

Emma immediately whines, "Oh, come on Lily-"

"Come on _Emma,_ " Lily interrupts, getting up and going around the island table, wrapping Emma in a hug before whispering in her ear. Regina itches to know what she says, but the oven fan is louder than Regina's ever realised and her whispers go on unheard. Once she's done, Lily brings Emma's tattooed wrist to her lips, kissing it gently. "You'd better keep in contact, you hear me, Swan?"

"I hear you," Emma says quietly. "I'll drive you back to Boston tomorrow."

"What's going on?" Regina interrupts, voice full of confusion. Lily lets go of Emma, twisting around with a grin that has Emma immediately lunging to cover her mouth, Lily grinning wider as she bats her hands away.

"Emma's full-on, house and home in love with you, Regina Mills."

"Lily," Emma groans, immediately going still, sagging into the taller woman. Lily smiles at Regina happily as she stands there in stunned silence, Henry gasping.

"Really? You really love mommy?" Henry twists to look up at Regina with wide eyes. "And you love Emma! That's why you've been so sad she's been gone!"

"Hole in one, kiddo, by that face," Lily says, before coming over, hand reaching out. "C'mon, you show me these action figures you were talking about the whole way here, let your moms talk this out." Henry is quick to scramble out of Regina's grasp, gripping Lily's hand tightly as he tugs her out of the room. Emma and Regina are left in the room alone and Regina abruptly thinks of their emails – of the days where _swanknightforever_ was a stranger who told funny stories about manipulative foster-brothers and terrible, presumptuous bus-drivers.

"I'm sorry."

Regina shakes her head sharply. "No, I'm sorry-"

"Why should you be sorry?" Emma questions, "You did nothing wrong."

"I really haven't," Regina says, thinking of Curses and ripped-out hearts. "You didn't do anything wrong, either. You just wanted to be with Lily-"

"We're better as friends," Emma interrupts, again, arms twisting around her body, hugging herself. "Everything with Lily is fun, but…but it's not permanent. Not like this is." She jerks a hand around. "This house, Henry, you…you're permanent and I'm so used to running away. I'm sorry I ran. I should have just talked to you, rather than leave you here. That was horrible and I know I'm one of the few people actually in your life. It's the reason we met in the first place."

"Emma…" Regina starts, before her phone chimes. She answers it, Graham trying to be calm as he explains he can't find Henry. "It's fine, Graham, he's here, at the house. He took a trip to Boston, to find Emma. She's home as well, she brought him back." She ends the conversation a minute later, after assuring Graham he's okay and so is she.

Emma squirms a little as she hangs up. "The kid is a maniac."

"Just like his mother," Regina says, breathing in deeply. Emma startles at that and Regina crosses her arms. "I may have made a few inquiries, while you were partying it up in Boston."

"I was working, not partying," Emma mutters, before nodding. "Do you want me gone?"

"Gone?" Regina barks. "Why the hell would I want you gone? Idiot, you're an absolute idiot. Your own girlfriend has more sense than you do." She sharply moves around the island table, hands coming to Emma's cheeks as she backs her up against the cupboard, their lips connecting.

Almost immediately, there's a bright, golden flash.

Not that Regina sees it.

She's too busy plundering Emma's mouth, Emma reciprocating and soon twisting them around. Regina's leg lifts and Emma runs a hand up her leg, pushing her skirt to her panty-line as her nails scrape along the skin.

They're interrupted by Lily, who shouts, "PDA!" Regina and Emma twist apart, looking to her as she holds her hands over Henry's eyes. "Emma Swan, princess of denial – I never knew you had it in you!" Henry wriggles.

"Aunt Lily, let go of my eyes!"

"Not until your mom pulls her skirt down, kiddo," Lily says with a smirk, Regina flushing as Emma quickly pulls her dress down, fixing it before taking a step backwards. Lily lets go of Henry – something Regina mentally thanks the woman for, before briefly wondering why Henry's calling her his aunt – her son immediately wrinkling his nose.

"Mommy, your face is all red."

"He means your lipstick is everywhere," Lily translates and Emma coughs, Regina mortified, immediately reaching for a handy packet of wet-wipes, already waiting for Henry to get covered in lasagne sauce. "Anyway, though, we came down to ask you if you saw it too."

"Saw what?" Emma questions.

Henry blows his arms out. "The light! It was yellow and green and it passed through us and then the wall and I looked out the window and it went all the way through Storybrooke to the forest and then a big purple dome sparkled before disappearing!"

Regina immediately becomes horrified. "It _what?_ " The Curse- the Curse was somehow broken and the wards, _are the wards even there anymore?_

"It sort of like, flashed," Lily says, eyeing her with a strange look. "You know, when I heard that Emma lived in Storybrooke, I was kind of surprised, Your Majesty – didn't think you'd let the Saviour inside, let alone fall in love with her."

Regina makes a strangled noise, staring at Lily for a moment before looking to Emma and then the front entryway.

"The what now?" Emma questions, but Regina is already stalking to the front door, swinging it open. She listens, heartbeat quickening as she hears faint shouts of anger. Slamming the door shut, Regina locks it, thoughts on overdrive. "Regina, what's going on?"

"They- we-" Regina starts, not knowing how to explain the fact that _a mob is forming to kill her._ But then she looks to Lily, straightening up. "How the hell did you know?"

"A guy approached me on a bus, a little while after I ran away, after I saw Emma for the second time." She reaches for her neck, bringing out a curved, dark shape on the end of a necklace. "Snow White and Prince Charming got me sent to this realm while I was hatching."

"Hatching?" Emma and Henry say at the same time, both confused beyond measure. Regina stares at the shard though – the _egg_ shard.

"You're a dragon," she says abruptly. Lily nods sharply. "The Charmings only know one dragon-"

"Maleficent. I was told a heap of shit that I didn't believe in, but I think it's ironic that you're part of why your own Dark Curse is broken."

"Okay, everyone, just hold up now," Emma interrupts, hand tight on Henry's shoulder. "Now, I know I'm tired, but even in my dreams, I'm not crazy enough to come up with this kind of weird-"

All of a sudden, there's pounding on her door. Regina startles, twisting to see figures through the glass and burning lights. _They can't seriously have torches._ Then a rock is thrown at the windows surrounding her door, cracking the glass.

"Come out, Your Majesty! We know you're there!" Frankenstein yells. "Don't think you can escape us all!"

"Upstairs, now," Regina orders, suddenly full of fear. She twists, looking at Emma and Henry. "Get upstairs, now, before they break the door down!"

"Mommy?" Henry starts, full of terror, but another rock cracks glass and Emma hauls him up, passing him over to Lily.

"Get him upstairs, hide out in one of the bathrooms and don't open for anyone but us."

"Got it," Lily hitches Henry onto her hip, the boy gripping on tight as the yells increase. Regina watches them go upstairs, flabbergasted that Emma isn't going with them.

"They're here to _kill_ me, Emma," Regina whispers, looking at- at the apparent _Saviour_ and her _True Love._ "You need to go upstairs."

"Like hell, especially if they're here to kill you," Emma says, bewildered. "No, I'm not leaving you, Regina." She comes over, kissing her sweetly and Regina thinks, _I want to get used to this_ , even knowing she's about to die at the hands of previously-Cursed townspeople. When the kiss ends, Emma takes Regina's hands tightly. "Give me the Cliffs Notes."

"Cliffs Notes…" Regina wonders how to explain it in its full complexity, without scaring her away, but her silence turns Emma's look into an impatient glare and she concedes. "I'm the Evil Queen. I used the Dark Curse to bring us all to this end, but I'm the only one who remembers that life – I made everyone forget and made them miserable, messing with their love-lives and separating parents from children, etcetera, etcetera. Your parents, Snow White and Prince Charming sent you here, to this realm right before my Curse struck, because there was a prophecy saying you'd be a Saviour, come to break the Curse on your twenty-eighth birthday."

Emma shakes her head, but breathes in audibly. "Okay, not so believable, but people are throwing rocks at your house and calling you by a royal title. So, believable. I'm twenty-six though, not twenty-eight. They really gave me up just because of a fucking prophecy?"

"Language, Emma."

"Fuck that, I'm allowed to swear at times like this," Emma says shakily, before kissing Regina again. Regina kisses her back before pulling away, hardening her resolve. "They aren't going to kill you."

"They've nearly succeeded, many times and vice versa, when it comes to your parents at least."

"Right, my parents – would I recognise them? Who are they? And how did we break this stupid Curse of yours?"

Regina glares slightly as she calls her Curse _stupid,_ but replies adequately. "Your father is the John Doe coma patient in the hospital and your mother is Mary-Margaret Blanchard?"

"The teacher?" Emma makes a funny face, before shaking her head. "And the…Curse?"

Regina takes a few moments to tell her, listening to the witch-hunt for a few seconds, calling for the Evil Queen, calling her to face justice.

"True Love's kiss," she says softly.

Emma stares at her.

"You mean, one of the most so-called light magics in existence?"

"The very same."

"Right," Emma squeezes her hands before letting go, stalking to the door. "Stay behind me, Regina."

"Behind you," Regina says, coming closer, watching her unlock the door and open it up, glaring at Frankenstein and then widening her eyes at the dozens of people arriving at their door.

"Who the fuck do you think you all are?" Emma questions as they fall silent. "You're fucking scaring our kid to death."

"Our kid?" Someone questions.

"Yeah," Emma glares, "Henry Daniel Mills, you'll have seen him around. Ever fucking heard of shutting the hell up? Last I checked, he was on the verge of tears and now he's hiding in a bathroom with my sister in all but blood, who happens to be some sort of fucking dragon, guarding him for me."

… _Emma does have a flare for the dramatic_ , Regina thinks after a few seconds of silence.

Frankenstein speaks up. "Regina Mills is the Evil Queen. I don't know who you are-"

"I'm the fucking Saviour and I broke this fucking Curse," Emma interrupts, "and if you have any gratitude what-so-fucking-ever, you'll fucking get off my lawn."

There are murmurs from the mob, but Regina's still in view and someone throws a rock, hitting the door-frame. Emma immediately flinches, before going for the umbrella stand just inside the door, pulling out the baseball bat that Regina had argued about leaving there. Seeing Emma wield it like a sword now, however, Regina's slightly grateful that Emma had argued to keep it.

"Get. Off. My. Lawn."

Frankenstein, the closest, backs off a bit, probably aware – as her superior at the hospital – that Emma doesn't really back down. Ever. At all.

"She's going to get her just desserts eventually, Nurse Swan," he warns.

"You can all fucking _try_ , because as I've said before, I've got a dragon on my side- actually, no, two, because once Lily's reunited with her mother, Maleficent's with me, too. Now, leave, before I start smashing heads."

* * *

"You aren't leaving, tomorrow," Regina warns Lily once Henry is retrieved and calmed down, gone downstairs with Emma to take the lasagne out of the oven.

Lily shrugs. "It's fine. I would have come back anyway. I heard what Emma said to them all. You really think that…that my mom would be on your side? You didn't fuck her over or anything, right?"

"No," Regina says tersely, looking Lily over. "You don't really look much like her, though your attitude reminds me of her. She's got the same personality as you, I do believe."

"Who do I look like? My dad?" Lily pesters and Regina tries to think of any man Maleficent would actually consort with, coming up null, because, well…

"In the Enchanted Forest," Regina starts smoothly, "there are certain spells and potions that allow conception between two women, which, considering Mal's sexuality, I think she would have used. However, towards the end, I don't know…"

That point is when Regina looks at Lily again, taking in everything about her, seeing how her jaw forms and what the colour of her skin is – what colour her hair is and her eyes. She stares and Lily frowns at her, the frown _so very familiar._

"Why are you looking at me like that?"

Regina's mouth goes dry and she turns, hurrying away from the dragon, but Lily calls _hey_ and comes to grab her, taking her shoulder and turning her around, eyes already half-shining with realisation.

"Regina, do you know?" Her voice is so _fragile_ then and Regina doesn't know what to say, lips parting because she _does_ know but…

"How could Mal keep you from me?" is what comes out, a gasp as much as a breath, her hands coming to Lily's shoulders, holding her and keeping Regina grounded.

"Mom's sexuality," Lily repeats, sounding strained. "I really did not expect this."

"You didn't expect this? I have two children!" Regina whispers, eyes wide as she steps back suddenly, hands lifting off of Lily's shoulders as something comes to her abruptly. "Oh my god, Emma."

Lily's own eyes widen. "Oh my god, _Emma_ ," she repeats, both women staring at each other in shock. Lily shakes her heads, hands rising. "Okay, lets make an agreement, right here, right now: until we sort everything out and everyone's on good terms and you and my mom talk and you and Emma get married, we _never ever_ talk about our sex lives."

"Agreed," Regina says, still slightly horrified. "Emma slept with you?"

" _Mom,_ " Lily hisses, "The rule!"

"Right, right," Regina shakes her head. "Never talk about that, right. It's just- you're my _daughter_."

Suddenly, Emma's horrified voice comes from the stairwell.

"She's _what?"_


End file.
